Petunia wandered through the local supermarket leisurely adding the items she needed to her cart. Her Vernon was a well paid man so she didn't have to worry about sales or deals. She only came to the grocery at this time because the other neighbourhood ladies shopped then, however, for some reason they all seemed to be avoiding her. Everytime she saw one as she shopped they would turn away and ignore her. She didn't understand, they had been perfectly lovely to her two days ago when she dropped off that sweet little boy Piers Polkis after his playdate with her darling Dudders. Had she committed a faux pas? Petunia racked her brain thinking of any events she missed in the past two days. She had already checked that there wasn't lipstick on her teeth and had discreetly smelt herself but she didn't understand why she was being ignored.
As she rounded the final corner of the store before heading to the cashier, she noted Mrs. Polkis and Mrs. Number Ten speaking softly to one another and approached bravely.
"Good day ladies." She chorused.
The two women stopped their conversation before Mrs. Number Ten spoke.
"I don't associate with people like you. Gloria, I'll wait for you at the end of the lane."
She then sped past Petunia leaving a wide berth between them as she passed.
"Gloria, what is going on with Cynthia today?" Petunia asked. "Actually, what is going on with everyone? Everyone is behaving so strangely."
"Petunia, I thought you were an upstanding member of the community. This is why I allowed my child to associate with your son despite the rumours."
"Rumours?"
"That Dudley is a bully who hurts other children." Gloria frowned then continued.
"I thought with a mother like you it simply couldn't be true. But I was wrong, because you're worse. Don't speak to me again, we are not friends."
With that Mrs. Polkis walked off leaving Petunia to shakily head to the cashier then head home. She felt like the entire store was judging her and she still didn't know for what but she could no longer be out in public.
By the time Vernon and the boys had arrived home, Petunia had convinced herself it was all a misunderstanding that would be easily sorted out. The other ladies would see that her family was the right sort and they would feel guilty.
"Pet, I got asked a weird question by Dudley's teacher today." Vernon said as he entered the house, dropping his briefcase off and embracing his wife in a hug.
"Oh." She replied, leaning in for comfort.
"She asked if the boy had his own room. I told her of course he did. It was very confusing, why would she care about the boy, she's Dudley's teacher."
"Oh." Petunia's face paled and she turned looking for the boy, had he been telling people what went on in their house, was this why the neighbourhood ladies were upset with her. Well she would set them all straight, starting with her sister's brat. As she headed for his cupboard, Dudley piped up.
"But he doesn't have a room daddy. He sleeps in the cupboard under the stairs."
"Dudley, did you tell the teacher that?" Asked Petunia. Had her son accidentally started this rumour.
"No mummy. Piers did." Dudley replied proudly as Petunia paled.
"He asked where Harry's room was when he came over to play so I showed him and I told him he could kick Harry if he wanted but he didn't want to. I told him it was ok because you said I could."
Petunia could feel her world crashing down on her, she couldn't think or feel and she felt like she couldn't breathe.
When Petunia came to it, she was strapped to a gurney with an EMT hovering over her. She could see police and ambulance lights in the distance and could vaguely hear sounds of chatter. She was quickly loaded into an ambulance and was removed from Privet Drive for what would be the last time.
When Petunia fainted, Vernon was hardly able to catch his wife as she fell. He lowered her to the floor gently and tried to wake her, when that didn't work, he called for an ambulance sounding frantic on the phone.
What Vernon didn't know is that the boys' school had been monitoring Harry for a while as a possible abuse case and the confirmation from Dudley and Piers plus Vernon's obvious confusion had lead to the opening of an investigation and the emergency call had triggered an alert for their address leading to both an ambulance and the police being sent out.
When the emergency services arrived, Vernon quickly ushered the EMT in to tend to his wife. The police, however, split up, one entering the house with the EMT and the other heading to talk to the neighbours who had all gathered outside to watch the drama unfold in real-time. The neighbourhood ladies were quite happy to tell the police everything they knew about the neighbours. The husband worked during the day and seemed nice but confused at home, he was a typical husband, unaware of what went on in the household. The wife, however, was a housewife, she had seemed so nice , almost too nice, she was the one who ran the house and was in charge of the boys. And the children, well their son was a spoiled bully but he had potential to be a nice child, the other boy was quiet and skinny and never spoke to anyone. He also didn't play with his cousin. He just showed up one day about three years ago and Petunia said he was her dead sister's child. The neighbours all agreed that the officer needed to speak to the Polkis family. Mr. and Mrs. Polkis didn't have much to add but they allowed their five year old son to speak to the police and he was a veritable goldmine of information on the Dursley household. Midway through the conversation with their child, the officer radioed the other police inside the house and shortly thereafter another ambulance showed up. It was quickly followed by a car belonging to Marge Dursley, the sister of Vernon.
Her brother had called her panicked and she made the hour and a half long drive in forty minutes, bringing with her an old family friend, Elias McGonagall, who her husband had served with in the military. When Marge arrived and was briefed on the events that had occurred, Petunia had fainted and her brother and sister-in-law were being investigated for child abuse of Petunia's nephew who they kept in a closet of some kind, she knew she had to act fast. She had never liked that woman and had felt the way she behaved was unhinged but her brother was in love so she'd held her tongue, however, now her brother was at risk of going down with her for child abuse and Marge knew she wasn't in any position to take in any children let alone one as spoiled as Dudley.
Apologizing to her friend who had come for the ride due to the emergency, Marge set off to do damage control, leaving Elias behind who quickly sent off a patronus to his favourite auntie Minnie at Hogwarts inquiring if Harry Potter lived at Privet Drive in Surrey, for no other reason than he'd been taken away in an ambulance due to a case of abuse. Once done, Elias set out to watch his friend handle the situation, had she been a witch Marge Dursley would have been in Slytherin and Elias was not ashamed to say he was attracted to her power.
"Yes officer, I understand the boy was being kept in a cupboard but my brother worked all the time and he trusted his wife to handle the household. She's always been a little odd especially when it came to her family but even I didn't think she'd abuse the children."
"Ma'am I understand your brother claims he didn't know but how could he not see that a child was being abused?" The police officer replied.
"Ask my brother if his son was abused? Ask him, he'll say no."
"We're not investigating abuse against his son, only his nephew Harry, the child who..."
Marge cut the officer off, "Do you think a child should be his weight? And I know you're probably saying well his father is overweight but my brother was a boxer, he always had a healthy appetite, becoming an office worker has done his waistline no favours but he was never overweight as a child. She was abusing both children and he didn't even notice."
The other officer, who had spoken to the neighbours commented almost idly. "The neighbours did say the son had behavioural issues and the nephew was extremely quiet. The officers at the hospital said she woke up and started screaming that her nephew was a witch. It's possible she's been having a psychotic break and no one noticed."
Marge tutted in faux concern. "I haven't visited in years but the last time I was here the boy did sleep in a bedroom upstairs. Vernon had mentioned moving him to the playroom for the visit. I had assumed the guest room became his bedroom, it's on the other side of the house you know so he likely never even noticed."
It helped that everything Marge had said was the truth, Harry had been upstairs for a brief period when he moved in but Petunia hadn't wanted to risk him infecting them in their sleep and moved him downstairs permanently.
Elias butted in. "While this is truly troubling, I think it might be best for both children to go to the hospital and possibly see someone who can help with this situation. It might also help if we all went to the hospital with the children and we could decide further what is going on. After all, do we even know if that child is her nephew? I remembered a case of a missing boy from Scotland with a similar name, maybe she kidnapped him."
Vernon came over then wringing his hands. "He just showed up on our doorstep one day, the next Pet had all his documents. I'm so confused, Dudley keeps crying and the boy was so small Marge."
Marge silently rolled her eyes, while her brother was very business savvy, he was incredibly stupid. She knew in her heart he was aware of the abuse but she also knew he'd allowed himself to be convinced by Petunia it wasn't abuse. Once he continued behaving like a dumb, lost husband, she would be able to salvage this situation by keeping him out of jail and with custody of his son. She already knew Petunia behaved psychotically when her family came up, all she needed to do on that end was play up the unhinged angle.
Across in Scotland, Minerva McGonagall flooed into her office and immediately set out to find one Albus Dumbledore. When she received the patronus from her nephew, she immediately cancelled her quiet plans to mark papers while overseeing a detention for two fighting students and flooed to Mrs. Figg's house in Surrey. She knew the old lady had left town to visit her family for the week but she had been granted free access to floo in as she pleased when the house was first setup. Transfiguring her clothes to match that of a muggle, she headed to Privet Drive and joined the queue of people watching the drama unfold. With some subtle questioning she learned that little Harry Potter lived in a cupboard, was mistreated, skinny, shy and bruised. He often wore dirty, oversized clothing and had most likely been abused. Additionally, she found out that he'd been taken away from Privet Drive in an ambulance and no one was sure what the state of his health was but if an ambulance had been called it was surely bad. Hearing this Minerva didn't stay longer and fled back to Mrs. Figg's house whereby she sent a patronus off to Amelia Bones relaying this information. If there was one person she trusted to handle this delicately, while still ensuring the saviour of the Wizarding world got the adequate help he needed, was Amelia Bones. As she flooed back to Hogwarts she realized that she needed to tell Albus. He had ignored her when she said not to leave the child there but he needed to know that the boy wasn't safe even if all she wanted to do was throttle him.
As she headed for his office, her Scottish anger rose up in her and by the time she bypassed the gargoyle and reached his office where he and young Severus Snape were having a discussion she was incoherent with rage.
"Why Minerva, were we supposed to meet tonight? Severus and I were just finishing up a discussion if you could give us a few..."
Albus Dumbledore was cut off as Minerva McGonagall slapped him as hard as she could, Severus looking on in shock.
"Why Albus I could kill you. I should kill you. I told you not to leave him there, I said they were the worst sort of muggles but no you said they were his family. His family Albus. Harry Potter is in a muggle hospital because his family abused him and put him there." She slapped him again and made to reach for her wand to finish him off when Severus Snape stopped her, calming draught in hand. She initially wanted to dismiss him but she forced herself to drink the draught and fell into a chair as Severus sent off a patronus to Madam Pomfrey.
"You left Harry Potter with Petunia Evans? You left the saviour of the Wizarding World with that woman?" Severus began shaking. "That would be like leaving a muggle in the care of Bellatrix LeStrange. Albus you have gone too far this time." Severus turned away from his mentor, now seeing him in a new, terrible light.
"Minerva, you said the child is at a muggle hospital? We need to move him to St. Mungo's. The Wizarding world will revolt over this but muggle healthcare can't adequately help a magical child."
"I sent Amelia Bones a patronus. She'll know what to do." Minerva responded, also ignoring Albus who was clutching his cheeks in shock, unsure what to do.
"Are you sure he was abused? The boy needs to remain with his family, for all we know there could have been a little roughhousing that is taken out of context. Petunia had a son, boys often fight, why I recall Aberforth and I fought a lot as children but..."
Minerva made to reach in her pocket for her wand again causing Severus to shoot up a shield before grabbing the woman and dragging her to the door. Clearly the calming draught wasn't working on Minerva and he really wasn't ready to deal with Albus. As he dragged them to Poppy's wing of the castle he sent a patronus to Filius detailing everything that happened since Minerva returned. The Ravenclaw Head of House was half goblin and magically stronger than even Albus at times plus he had been a Duelling Champion, he could handle Albus and take charge of the school while he handled the now sobbing Minerva. Severus had just enough presence of mind to duplicate the message to Pomona with an added line requesting she reach out to Amelia to offer support before he ended up locked away in the Hospital Wing with two emotional women and a debilitating amount of guilt.
Seven months later and everything had changed. Petunia Evans, because Vernon had divorced her to save his name on advice from his sister, was a long term resident of an insane asylum. Marge had done a good job of painting her as crazy and then a Ministry Unspeakable had done the rest by removing her memories of the Wizarding world. As it had been a core part of her life since she was twelve, her brain had been unable to compensate for such a loss and the official reports stated that she had suffered a psychotic break.
Vernon had gotten off by the skin of his teeth but had had an uphill battle to keep custody of his son after the legal system had ripped into him for his lack of awareness of what happened in his household. He had taken a leave of absence from work, sold his house, bought an apartment in London and spent most of his days exercising and going to therapy with his son. His last act as Petunia's husband had been to sign custody of Harry Potter over to Amelia Bones as she could prove she knew his parents and Marge had reminded him that he would not be able to care for two abused children and his son needed to be his only priority.
Harry had been moved to an exclusive private hospital a few days into his stay at the Surrey hospital by a distant cousin of his father's who had been looking for him since his parents' death. With how interconnected the Wizarding world was, Amelia was related to Harry, though so was almost everyone else with magical heritage. The boy had been starved, bruised and had had cracked ribs but he had healed magnificently thanks to magic and was seeing a magical therapist to help with his mental trauma. The boy had had his first birthday party since his parents' passing and Amelia had invited all of his yearmates as the entire magical community was aware of his abuse. It still shocked Amelia that she was friendly with known dark wizards like the Malfoys and the Zambinis but both Mr. Malfoy and Mrs. Zambini had stepped forward and offered to handle Harry's muggle family discreetly if she wanted. They had also managed to get the more aggressive reporters away from stalking the child and now Draco and Blaise were regular playmates of Harry, her niece Susan and Susan's best friend Hannah. Funny how the world worked.
At Hogwarts outwardly nothing had changed but internally Filius Flitwick ran the school bringing about new changes that increased unity among the students. Albus had quietly abdicated his role to Filius, and while on paper was still the head of the school, he spent much of his time hunting down magical artifacts and swearing that Voldemort would return if he didn't stop him. Albus had publicly managed to get away from the scandal with a slap on his wrist only because there was no reasonable way to have noticed the abuse and his muggle family had been his closest relatives.
And Harry, for the first time in his memory he was fed and loved and cared for. He now knew that he wasn't supposed to always be in pain and he had friends who looked out for him and shared their toys with him and wouldn't let anyone pick on him. He was learning that what happened at Privet Drive wasn't normal but he was and it was something he enjoyed.